


Mist Wolves

by Keolah



Category: Magic: The Gathering
Genre: Action/Adventure, F/M, Romance, Tragedy, Violence, Wolves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 1995-01-01
Updated: 1995-01-01
Packaged: 2017-11-15 03:12:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,773
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/522505
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Keolah/pseuds/Keolah
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Traveling through the wilderness of the plane of Spiremist brings many dangers. Can this ragtag group survive being stalked by mist wolves?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mist Wolves

This is a plane of rolling mist, of haze clouding your vision until you see things that are not there and cannot see what is truly there. It is a place where spires reach out into the sky, their roots hidden. It is a place where creatures of all kinds adapt themselves to the mist-covered lands and learn to live without relying on sight. From the sky this world in this age was named Spiremist.

"I don't know, Jenk," admitted the man. "We may have to return before dawn. If this weather keeps up, we should head for cover right now." 

"Let's keep on going," the other told him. "We're still a full day ahead of the storm." 

The first man sighed, shrugged, and trudged wearily after Jenk. After no more than ten paces, he stopped again and took off his helmet. Long black hair flowed freely in the quickening winds. 

"Put that back on!" hissed Jenk. "Someone might see you!" 

"Who's going to see me?" he pointed out. "We're out in the middle of nowhere. Anyone with any sense has taken to shelter by now. And there's so much mist you can't see a tree ten paces away." 

"I just don't want you taking any chances, you hear," Jenk shook his head. "Your people aren't exactly on good terms with mine, you know." 

"As if they ever were," muttered the man, but Jenk had moved away and didn't hear him. Reluctantly, he gathered his hair into his helmet and tightened the chin strap until it was nearly choking him. Then he followed Jenk into the shifting mist. 

An hour later a dark line of trees materialized and Jenk called a halt. The other man gratefully slumped down against a tree trunk. He was asleep in moments. Not long after he woke to the smell of fresh meat. Jenk had built a low fire and was cooking a small rabbit. The golden glow reflected off the prince's pale blue eyes, illuminating his neatly shaven face with gentle streaks of light. 

"Good morning, Freo Priya," smiled Jenk. "Or should I say evening?" 

The helmeted man quickly glanced around with his eyes, as if making sure no one was near. "Have you seen anything out of the ordinary around here?" 

Jenk shook his head. "Nothing has emerged from the mist since these trees did." 

Freo nodded, satisfied, and poked the meat with his knife. "Almost done," he observed. 

Like a curtain the mist opened to reveal a pack of grey wolves. Attracted by the scent of fresh meat--not from the rabbit but from the humans--the wolves had tracked their prey through the blanket of mist using only the sense of smell. 

Freo cried out and dropped his knife, reaching instead for his sword. Jenk pulled a long hunting knife from his belt and stood back-to-back with Freo. The wolves circled them, one with the mist. 

"Mist wolves!" snarled Jenk. "Can't see them coming until they strike, then you can't even catch them retreating." 

A single wolf leapt out of the haze and ripped at Jenk, who slapped it aside with a flick of his blade. A pair of wolves converged upon Freo, but he kicked one away and slashed the other into two bloody halves. Then they all attacked at once. 

Out from the mist emerged a great dark woman who raised her hands and sent the wolves running in fear. "I knew you couldn't make it on your own, brother." 

Freo pulled Jenk away from the hovering wolves, invisible in the haze, and said, "Nox?" 

"How did you ever manage to attract an entire pack of mist wolves?" wondered the black-clad woman. 

"Nox--" 

"Just wait until Father hears about this! Little Freo had to be saved from a pack of mist wolves!" 

"Nox Priya!" cried her brother. 

She cocked her head, her silky ebony hair awash in the wind, creating a dark halo about her face. "Come on. We've been looking for you. You should have been in two hours ago. Now I can see why you weren't," said Nox wryly. "Jenk Elram, I presume?" He nodded, and she held out her hand. "Nox, daughter of Neo and Fox Priya." 

Jenk took her hand and gave it a perfunctory shake. "How far?" 

"Two hours, if we walk fast," replied Nox. 

"Let's get going," he suggested quietly. "I don't know how long that spell will hold them." 

"Long enough," Nox shrugged. "That particular pack won't follow us very far into the forest. They're primarily plains creatures. They'll find adequate prey out there, preferably non-human." 

Jenk nodded nervously. His people, like the Priyas' people, did not often venture onto the plains, prefering their cities to the misty wilderness. 

"Jenk?" spoke a quiet but insistent voice out from the forest. "Are you Jenk Elram?" 

"I am he," Jenk replied as an elflike princess emerged from the mists. "Who do I have the pleasure of addressing?" 

"Reeshandi Kirtranyon, Princess of Mendar. Your future wife." She smiled sweetly, but it was not an empty smile from an empty woman. Rather, her little grin was almost mocking, as if she were making fun of Freo, Nox, even Jenk. It was as if there were a joke, and she were the only one present who understood that it even was a joke. 

"Your Highness," Freo began nervously, "you should not have come here. It is dangerous--" 

Reeshandi completely ignored him. "It took me forever to find you. I was certain you'd be farther on. But then I sensed Black Magic in this direction and recognized its flavor as Nox's." 

Jenk stood there, silent, wholly entranced by Reeshandi's behavior and appearance, as well as her independant personality. Though he didn't know her, he was already in love with her, which was just as well since they were betrothed anyway. And Jenk felt that Reeshandi loved him too. 

"The girl is perceptive," Nox nodded, recognizing the princess's largly latent talent. 

Reeshandi was slight as an elf, and indeed she was half-elven, her mother being a rogue elf who had wandered into the Mendarian Swamps by chance. She was now King Reetus's only living granddaughter, her half-sister having died two years earlier in the plague. Three of her five brothers proved stronger than little Kareen, and they now governed Mendar in place of their frail grandfather. Even their father, the former Crown Prince of Mendar, had fallen to the plague, leaving his son Reekar in charge. 

Jenk didn't know any of this. He was a rare specimen in himself, his mother being from the Spirrian Highlands and his grandmother from the Larandish Islands. Prince of Flekor, he was expected to marry someone from the royal families of Spirria or Larandbar, or from the nobility of the Flekorian Plains, since Flekor and Mendar had been at war for as long as Spiremist had existed. 

Reeshandi didn't know her betrothed's ancestry. No one knew that any child resulting from the union of these two would be of all blood, of equal portions of all Five Races of the Mist. Such a child would have no enemies, and might very well end this age-old war. 

"Which way is Mendar?" asked Jenk. "I've lost track of direction." 

Nox pointed unwavering north-northeast. "That's unwise, you know. Mist wolves always come after people who have lost their way." 

"I learned that wolves never used to prey on people," Reeshandi told them. "Ages ago, wolves were afraid of people, but now that food is so scarce on the plains and in the forest, they've been forced to hunt any prey they can find." 

"Speaking of wolves, have you set up a ward spell, Nox?" Freo asked his sister. 

"Not yet. I'm still weak from that last one. But I'd better do it now before we sleep. Or do we want to travel further first?" 

"Here is fine," the princess declared, and her word was law. 

Nox took out her components and set up the ward spell. Jenk offered his betrothed a bit of rabbit, but she shook her head. Freo decided to clean his weapons. There were bits of wolf clinging to them. 

The mist-storm broke not too long afterward, setting the haze alive with tumultous winds and spinning mist, growing heavier until it was swirling rain. But Nox's ward spell kept out the storm, protecting the party from the violent mists. The whirlwind rains and heavy mist raged on through the night, as if trying in vain to destroy these four offenders, those who had dared cross the mist wolves, and escape.

Come dawn, Nox removed her ward spell and they set off again toward Mendar through the shifting mists. As they travelled, Jenk fell deeper and deeper in love with Reeshandi. Her charismatic personality was irresistable, yet tantalizingly indifferent, as if this were merely a game for her. Jenk's mind sounded warning bells, yet his heart was convinced that she loved him too. 

During the hours of walking, he fantasized about her, knowing that it was all right since they were to be married. He envisioned her elflike body-- 

"Mist wolves directly ahead," Nox informed them quietly. 

"Where?" Freo asked, his hard eyes flitting around, searching for the elusive predators. 

"Between those two pines," his sister told him. 

"I don't see them," Jenk commented, squinting into the mist. 

"They're there," Reeshandi breathed. "They're waiting for us to let down our guard." 

"I thought they only hunt on the plains," Jenk wondered, puzzled. 

"This breed hunts in the forest," Nox replied, not taking her eyes off the hidden beasts. 

"Where are they?" Jenk murmured. "They're nowhere." 

"Keep your guard!" Nox commanded. "They'll attack if you let down your guard!" 

"Nox Priya, I don't see them," Jenk told her. 

"Nor I," said Freo, still looking for Nox's wolves. 

"Don't relax! Face the mist!" Nox hissed. "If you value your life you will do as I say. Prince or no, you are completely ignorant to the ways of the wolves!" 

They chose that moment to attack. Snarling and growling, the pack of mist wolves leapt out of the hazy air and tried to tear the travellers limb from limb. It was all they could do to ward off the beasts. 

It was an especially large pack that was hunting them today, perhaps a full score of animals. Brother and sister then became food for the wolves, who dragged the bodies off to feed while leaving the betrothees under guard. Their behavior was almost human. 

"Reeshandi," Jenk murmured. "I love you." 

She glanced at him sideways and told him coldly, "I never loved you." 

Then the mist wolves came for them.


End file.
